ACT ·• III SCENE ·• 1 _A burned street in Rome: night._ _THRASEA._ In these burned streets I wander like a ghost: Rome is no more: O see, my memoried Rome, My senatorial city is burned and gone! 1101 The city of Camillus, whose abrupt And tortuous streets my ancestors have threaded, Here going about a tower of Servius, Here an Etruscan temple of carved wood, Here by some patriot tribune’s gabled home: All gone, as the free spirit that made it, gone: And I, like this old beam, in vain escaped The burning, shall be cast out, nor find place In the new Rome that Cæsar promises, O’erlaid with perfected monotony, The textbook ornaments of shallow taste, Imperial gewgaws.—What poet was it said That Desolation was a beautiful thing? What parricidal spirit? To cut down And burn the gnarl’d trunk of a thousand years, And plant the trifling shoot of one gay summer Rootless in the ground. (_Cries heard._) What noise is this? Some wretched Christian, that in blind revenge The maddened people sacrifice. _Enter the mob carrying off Clitus—Epicharis following._ _MOB._ Burn him! To the Vatican! to the Vatican! Burn him! _EPICHARIS._ Pity, pity, pity, sirs! He is guiltless, indeed he is guiltless. He is my brother. _Thr._ Stay, ye mad fools! To what detestable, Forbidden crime of hellish witchcraft haste ye! _Mob._ Here’s another. He’s a Christian. Seize him! _Thr._ Hands off, fools! I am Thrasea. _Mob._ Thrasea! 1130 _Thr._ Are ye Romans? _Citizen._ ’Tis Nero’s order. _Ep._ (_kneeling to Thrasea_). O sir, save thou my brother. _Cit._ If thou wert Thrasea, man, thou wouldst not hinder us from punishing them that fired the city. _Mob._ On! on! _Another Cit._ Nay, nor let any Christian woman touch thee. _Mob._ To the Vatican! on! (_Going._) _Thr._ Fools, I am Thrasea, and I bid you stay. _Mob._ Burn him, burn him! [_Exeunt Mob, etc._ _Thr._ Stay! Are ye men? _Ep._ O sir, ’tis my brother, my brother Clitus; save him! _Thr._ What can I do? Alas, (_calls_) stay! stay! (_To Ep._) Thou seest. [_Exeunt running._ _Enter Lateranus and Flavus._ _LATERANUS._ This is the only way. The Fabian street Is blocked with red-hot ashes. _FLAVUS._ Where’s this Natalis? _Lat._ He should be here; we must wait for him. _Fla._ You trust him, sir? _Lat._ Yes. _Fla._ And Piso? _Lat._ Certainly. _Fla._ It is hard, sir, for a man like me, to trust a man like Piso. I yield to the choice of my betters, and the vote of the majority. I would not split the party. Yet I wish we had persuaded Seneca! _Lat._ So do I, and it cost him a pang to refuse. ’Twas only Thrasea’s opinion that overweighted him.